Listening

The start to this week was a little different compared to my usual. Late last Sunday afternoon, Spencer, Rudder and myself packed up the Jeep and headed up the road to Cedarwood Hideaway, an off-grid AirBNB hosted by our friends Shelley and Brien Getten.

It was Spencer’s birthday wish to spend a couple days in the woods, unplugged from work life and plugged-in to the natural world. We promised our phones would stay locked away in a cabinet for the weekend and we vowed only to take pictures on my little CampSnap camera.

I don’t know about you, but the second I become unreachable, an overwhelming sense of peace washes over me. I’m not sure if it’s because I’m a millennial and I grew up during a time of ridiculously fast technological advancement, or because at heart, I’m a bit of a hermit, but the more I grow, the more I love spending time away from my phone. I love that technology brings us closer together and gives me the opportunity to share my art with the world in the digital space, but sometimes it serves as more of a distraction from creative flow and soul-centered artistry than I’d like.

I spent probably 40 hours in this space with my partner and our dog. We played games, went on lots of walks in the woods, we read books — both together and separately, and I sketched, a lot. 

In this time, something sort of magical happened. I could finally hear myself again. Like the nuances from my own imagination were louder and clearer than they’ve been over the past few months. I found myself noticing things I don’t normally pay any attention to in my day to day.

Like how beautiful steam looks against morning light as it rises from a fresh cup of coffee. Or how I enjoyable it is to sketch scenes from a novel I’m reading that I imagine in my mind’s eye.

What I came to remember is how important it is to let my surroundings become quiet, to let my mind become still, and to listen.

It’s when I listen that I notice the beauty of the world around me, I notice how incredible it is to be alive at this time in this world, to live in this space and to have the ability to see beauty in every scene I step into.

Now I won’t say the solution to all my problems is to disconnect from everything, throw away my phone and wander off into the wilderness forever (although, that sounds really nice to me), I will say that removing distractions from my space from time to time is one of the best ways to reconnect with myself, my creativity and my own spirit and it’s something I am going to continue to do more often.